There
are many wonderful museums and galleries in Rome, all worthy of seeing
if one has the time. Remember, though much of Rome shuts down during the
month of August for vacation, most museums and galleries remain open.
You should always check with the most current travel guide of your choice
in case hours of operation have changed. They are listed below according
to subject matter: religious museums, military museums, archaeological
museums, science museums, medieval and modern museums, and particular museums.
The Vatican Museums are listed under The Vatican and Environs on its own
page. Hours of operation and days open sometimes change without notice,
as do phone numbers, so it is very important for you to confirm this information
before visiting each museum or gallery. The admission charge,
if any, also changes, and since I do not live in Rome, it is very difficult
for me to keep admission charges up to date. If I am aware that there
is an admission charge, I will indicate "Admission charge". Some
travel guides (such as Frommer's and Eyewitness Travel Guide)
lists admission charges for the current year. Also, as the years
go by, more and more museums and galleries also have web sites, or other
web sites that feature information on current events and/or current price
information so you might want to check the Internet as well. Some
of the items I believe are well worth viewing in each of the museums/galleries
are listed below and will be added to periodically as I discover new things.
Lists of works worth seeing does not by any means constitute a complete
listing of all the magnificent works of art on exhibit in any of these
museums and galleries. They are listed as important works worth considering,
and/or are some of my favorites.

RELIGIOUS
MUSEUMS

Museum
of the Souls of the Dead, Lungotevere Prati, Tel. 654.05.17. Open same
time as that of the Church of Santo Cuore del Suffragio, a.m.-12:30pm,
and 5p-7p, when the church is open. This church has been rarely open
whenever I have tried to go inside, so it is on a hit-and-miss basis.
This museum is housed in a room next to the neogothic church in the Prati
section of Rome. It was established in about 1889-90 when, in 1887,
Victor Janet (a priest) started to collect fabrics, clothes, frocks, breviaries,
bibles, night-shirts, skull caps, and wooden tablets fire-marked by the
hands of the dead to prove to the living their supernatural existence.
Relics are displayed in showcases. First is a face of a soul in purgatory
printed on a wall. Handprints of the dead left on fabrics and clothing
are still very visible. A unique museum if you have extra time to
explore.

Permanent
Exhibition of the Jewish Community of Rome, Synagogue, Lungotevere
Cenci, 15. Tel. 06/6840.06.61. Mon.-Thurs. 9 a.m.-5 p.m., Fri. 9 a.m.-2
p.m., Sun. 9 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Admission charge. This was established
in 1963 and is within the walls of the Synagogue on the first floor.
The Synagogue was finished in 1904 and was built over the ruins of the
old ghetto. It was built to the design of architects Nino Costa and
Osvaldo Armanni. Of special interest is the grand seat of the
Prophet Elijah used for the circumcision rite (1870). Other items
of interest are photographic reproductions of codexes and manuscripts along
with numerous original documents illustrating the relations between Italian
Jews and the state; documentation of Nazi occupation (No. 27). In
No. 127 are half crowns, basins, and lamps. There are also bound
prayer books on display, the first of which has a tooled silver cover of
the late 18th century. Keys for the ark and other liturgical
objects as well as Berachot (blessings) written on parchment for
a certain Ester Meghillar (18th century).

Museum
of the Catacombs of St. Sebastian, via Appia Antica, 136. Tel. 785.03.50.
Winter hours: 8:30am-noon; 2:30pm-5pm. Summer: 8:30am-noon; 2:30pm-5:30pm.
Thursday closed. Admission charge. Children under five are free.
This museum holds the "Memoria Apostolarum" and tomb of Sebastian the Martyr,
in addition to inscriptions and tombstones from the excavations.

Museum
and Picture Gallery of the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls,
Piazzale S. Paolo, Tel. 541.03.41. 9a-1p; 3p-6p. Closed Sundays. Admission
charge. Contains a collection of Christian inscriptions and tombstones
from the burial grounds at Ostia. Some medieval frescoes depicting
various popes. Has a large collection of sarcophagi, inscriptions,
architectural fragments, tombstones and other items from the nearby Romano-Christian
cemetery, that is on exhibit in the cloister ... a must see if you are
there anyway.

Museum
of St. Pancras, Piazza di S. Pancrazio, 5.d, Basilica di S. Pancrazio.
Tel. 581.04.58. Visit upon request. This museum is located in the
sacristy of the church and contains artifacts that were in the ancient
fifth century basilica; sculptured, epigraphic, lapidary material as well
as various sarcophagi.

Franciscan
Museum, Istituto Storico dei Cappuccini, Circonvallazione Occidentale
6850 (Grande Raccordo Anulare km. 65). Tel. 625.19.61. Admission charge;
open by appointment only. The main focal point of the Museo Francescano.
Of special interest is an engraving printed on parchment by Gillis van
Schoor, hand-colored during the first half of the 17th century of St.
Francis Changing Water Into Wine; a beautiful plate depicting St.
Anthony of Padua; a painting on wood by F. Bril in 1583 entitled, Stigmatization
of St. Francis. Quite a few rooms to explore with spectacular
paintings including small paintings on copper.

Museum
of the Historical Chamber, via S. Giovanni Decollato, 22. Church
of S. Giovanni Decollato. Tel. 678.94.48. Open on the 24th of June only.
Admission charge. A macabre museum containing a collection of registers
of the executed, baskets for the heads of those decapitated, large knives
for cutting nooses, ropes, bags and hoods. Gruesome to some extent,
but interesting.

Museum
of St. John Lateran, Basilica di S. Giovanni in Laterano. Tel. 698.64.33.
Open daily 9am-1pm and 3pm-6pm. Admission charge. The treasures of the
basilica are in the Room of Piux IX. Also, a wonderful fresco by
Raphael.

Museum
of St. Vincent and Anastasius, vicolo dei Modelli, 73. Tel. 678.30.98.
Open same times as the church. This is an underground chapel that
holds the physical remains of 22 popes, from Sistus V to Leo XIII.
Check out the facade of the church believed to be by Longhi.

MILITARY
MUSEUMS

Historical
Museum of the Carabinieri, via Cola di
Rienzo, 294. Tel. 653.06.96. Every day except Mon. 8:30am-noon. Admission
charge. This museum was officially set up in 1925 after World War
I. It was officially opened in its present home in 1937. Quite
a few rooms to ramble through with many paintings depicting various victories
and battles.

Museum
of Navy Flags, located on the left-hand side of the Victor Emanuel
Monument. Weekdays 9:30am-1:30pm. Admission charge. Three huge adjoining
rooms that contain very large exhibits: an anchor for blocking a
port, the "MAS 15" of Luigi Rizzo; and a large fragment of plating belonging
to the submarine "Scire", etc.; also, flag boxes and flags of the most
famous Italian warships, beginning with the frigate "G. Garibaldi" (1860-1894).
An inlaid ivory chest that contains the flag given to the ship "Sicilia"
in 1896 by the women of Sicily is especially interesting.

Historical
Museum of the Liberation of Rome, via Tasso, 145. Tel. 755.38.66. Sat.
4pm-7pm; Sun. 10am-1pm. Library open Sat. 4pm-7pm. Admission charge.
This museum is housed in a building that previously held the cultural section
of the German Embassy in Rome, and that became notorious after September
8, 1943, when it was chosen as the headquarters of the SS High Command
under H. Kappler. In January of 1944, part of the building was made
into a prison and all of the cells that were formerly bedrooms, kitchens
and cubbyholes, were bricked up with only small ventilation holes left
above the doors and has been left in that state. Quite interesting.

Historical
Museum of the Grenadiers of Sardinia, Piazza S. Croce in Gerusalemme,
7. Tel. 756.657. Tues., Thurs., Sat. 10am-noon. Admission charge.
This museum is in a small building next to the Brigade's old headquarters,
started in 1903. Contains historical documents, paintings, weapons,
sculptures, and curios that illustrate the varied history of this Corps
dating from 1659.

Historical
Museum of Revenue Officers, Piazza Armellini, 20. Tel. 428.841.
Weekdays 9am-noon. Admission charge. Inaugurated in 1937. Sections
are dedicated to the origins, to the Risorgimento, the Great War, the Libyan
War, the Abyssinian War, and World War II. There is also a shrine
to the memory of fallen members of the Corps.

Historical
Infantry Museum, Piazza S. Croce in Gerusalemme, 9. Tel. 778.524. Weekdays
9am-noon. Admission charge. This museum was set up after World War
II, in 1948. Of interest is a small chapel on the first floor with
a bronze group by sculptor Edmondo Furlan depicting Christ on the Cross
and Two Infantry Men. Very moving.

Historical
Museum of the Bersaglieri, Gatehouse of Porta Pia. Tel. 486.723. Tues.
and Thurs. 9am-1pm. Guided visits also on the other weekdays, except Sundays,
on request, same visiting hours. Admission charge. The gatehouse
was constructed on the orders of Pius IV to Michelangelo's design between
1561-64 at the old Nomentana Gate that opened in the Aurelia Wall.
After the Tower over the gate collapsed, Pope Pius IX commissioned architect
Virgilio Vespignani to restore the monument in 1852. Wonderful general's
helmets and berets from the period of King Umberto's reign are worth seeing.
There is also a
shrine in honor of over 100,000 Bersaglieri who
gave their lives for Italy, from the Goito bridge in 1848 to the slopes
of the Apennines in 1945. Many paintings, sketches, photographs,
documents, and military relics from the Wars of Independence as far back
as 1848. At the end of the exhibition is a room devoted to the 187
Medals for individual military valour awarded to members of the Corps of
the Bersaglieri.

Museum
of the Historical and Cultural Institute of Engineers Corps, Lungotevere
della Vittoria, 31. Civilian tel. 359.54.46. Military tel. 35637.
Weekdays 9am-1pm. Sun and Hol. closed. Admission charge. Interesting
museum. Of interest is the coherer of the Marconi radio-telegraph
station (Marconi was an officer of the Engineers). Room 20 contains
an iconographic collection of St. Barbara and the Archangel Gabriel.

Historical
Museum of Military Vehicles, Military City of Cecchignola 86, viale
dell'Esercito. Tel. 501.18.85 Caserma Rossetti. Open 9am-noon and 2pm-4pm
except Sat., Sun. and Hol. Admission charge. Contains rare artifacts
of historical importance, including a Fiat car used by King Victor Emanuel
III when visiting the front lines during World War I.

ARCHAEOLOGICAL
MUSEUMS

Villa
Giulia National Museum, Piazzale di Villa Giulia, 9. Tel. 320.19.51.
Tues.-Fri. 9am-7pm; Sat. 9 am-11 pm, Sun. 9am-8 pm. Closed Monday. Admission
charge; children under 18 and seniors over 60 free. The Museum is
housed in the Villa of Pope Julius III, or Villa Giulia. In one of
the courtyards is a reconstructed Etrusco-Italic
Temple of Alatri.
Of special interest is a clay statue of
Apollo of Vejo, end of the
6th century B.C.; the
Sarcophagus of the Newlyweds, from Caere,
end of the 6th century B.C.; The Chigi Oinochoe, from Formello (640-625
B.C.), and earrings in a beauty-case from the end of the 6th century B.C.

Forum
Antiquarium, Piazza S. Maria Nuova, 53. Tel. 679.03.33. 9am-one hour
before sunset. Closed Tues., Sun., Holidays. Ticket to Roman Forum valid
here. Six rooms. Created at the turn of the century by Giocomo Boni. Set
up in the Convent of S. Maria Nuova. Contains findings from various zones
of the Forum as well as bones of animals and domestic remains from the
wells at the Temple of Vesta from the 9th to 7th centuries B.C. Clothes
found in tombs of the sepulchretum (archaic necropolis). Architectural
and sculptural fragments and sculpture from the Fons Juturnae, Imperial
portraits, and epigraphs. Very interesting and worth seeing while visiting
the Forum.

Barracco
Museum, via dei Baullari, 1. Tel. 06/688.068.48, Tues.-Sat. 9am-7pm,
Sun. 9am-1pm, Closed Monday. Admission charge. Houses the personal
collection of Barone Giovanni Barracco, given to the City of Rome by him
in 1902 in addition to the building that housed the collection at the time.
In 1948, the collection was moved to "The Piccola Farnesina" built by Antonio
da Sangallo the Younger, where it is still exhibited. There is everything
from Egyptian sphinxes to a Christian sarcophagus of the 4th century; also
the famed sculpture by Lysippus,
The Wounded Bitch.

Archaeological
Museum Ostia, located at the excavations of ancient Ostia outside Rome.
Tel. 565.00.22. Open 9am-4:30pm. Admission charge. Located in the old "Casone
del Sale" (Salt House). Converted to a museum in 1865-66 by Pius IX.
Reliefs in terracotta, decorative terracotta from the area of the Republican
castrum, a room devoted to Oriental cults found at Ostia, a room with Roman
copies of Greek originals. Greek and Italic red-figure pottery. Roman portraitures
and a room dedicated to Guido Calza. Another room is dedicated to housing
sarcophagi, a room devoted to the decor in opus sectile from the building
outside Porta Marina, and a room devoted to paintings and mosaics.

Museum
of Etruscan and Italic Remains, University City, Faculty of Letters,
Dept. of Historical, Archaeological, and Anthropological Sciences of Antiquity,
Tel. 495.32299. Admission for study purposes only, special permission required.
Contains a large quantity of material from the "Etruscan Art and Civilization
Exhibition" held in Milan in 1955 and of the Gorga Collection. It
was inaugurated on August 9, 1962. It is closely associated with
the Museum of the Origins and the Museum of Plaster Casts.

Museum
of Roman Civilization, Piazza G. Angelli (E.U.R.), Tel. 592.61.35,
Tues.-Sat. 9am-12:30pm; Thurs. also 4pm-7pm, Sun. 9am-1pm. Closed Monday.
Admission charge. This museum was created under the name of Museo
dell'Impero Romano in 1927 with material that had figured in the Archaeological
Exhibition at the Baths of Diocletian in 1911. It has 59 rooms that
exhibit a large number of reproductions (casts, models, drawings, and photographs).
Monuments and works of art from all the provinces of Rome. Of special
interest is a model of a single-oared warship, a model of an apartment
building in ancient Ostia Antica, and a model of the Colosseum.

Museum
of Plaster Casts, same address as the Museum of Etruscan and Italic
Remains above; admission for study purposes only, special permission required.
Contains more than 1,000 plaster casts of Greek sculptures dating from
the Archaic period to the late Hellenistic period. Of interest is
a statue of Group of Tyrannicides (Crisius and Nesiote) (477-476
B.C.).

Capitoline
Museum: A very interesting museum indeed, and contains the
oldest public collection in the world, one well worth visiting. Of
interest is the famous sculpture,
The Dying Gaul. There are
many sculptures in the Atrium including a statue of Minerva, Emperor
Hadrian in Pontifical robes, and Faustina the Elder, a copy
from the 5th century B.C.

The
ground floor is devoted to the Oriental Cults and include fragments of
Roman
calendars, and the Alexander Severus Sarcophagus of the 3rd
century B.C. The courtyard opposite has a huge statue of
Mars
Ultor, restored as Pyrrhus; a staircase leads to the first floor gallery.
Important works here are Leda and the Swan, 4th century B.C.; a
large Krater set on a well-head from Hadrian's Villa; and the infant Hercules
Strangling the Hydra. Next is the Hall of Emperors, that contain
an enormous amount of busts of Roman Emperors, the majority of which came
from the collection of Cardinal Albani. Of importance is Commodus
as a Young Man. In the middle of the room is a seated figure
of Helena, the mother of Constantine.

The
Hall of Philosophers contains busts of philosophers, poets, and orators.
Of interest are busts of Socrates, Homer,
Cicero,
and Lisia. In the following Hall, the centerpiece are statues
of the Young and Old Centaurs from Hadrian's Villa in grey marble.
They are signed by Aristeas and Papias of Aphrodisia, artists of the time
of Hadrian.

In
the Hall of the Faun, of interest is The Boy With a Mask of Silenus
from the first part of the Imperial period, and The Boy With a Goose,
from the 2nd century B.C. original. In the Hall of the Dying Gaul
is the famed statue of The Dying Gladiator (or The Dying Gaul)
(see photo).

The
Hall of the Doves (its name comes from the famous mosaic of Four Doves
Drinking From a Vase that came from Hadrian's Villa) contains mosaic
of masks and sarcophagus of a child. Also, the Cabinet
with the famous Capitoline Venus, a Roman copy of the early Hellenistic
original.

Palazzo
dei Conservatori: the entrance court contains the fragmented
remains of the Statue of Constantine. In the opposite portico
is the Head of Constantius II, that was another colossal statue.
There are also reliefs on the walls depicting the provinces conquered by
Rome.

On
the first landing of the staircase are four grandiose reliefs from the
2nd century A.D., three of which (Marcus Aurelius Sacrificing in Front
of the Temple of Capitoline Jupiter; Triumph of Marcus Aurelius, Marcus
Aurelius Pardoning His Conquered Enemies) come from the arch dedicated
to Marcus Aurelius. The fourth depicts
Hadrian's Entry Into Rome.
The Hall of Captains contains frescoes portraying episodes of the history
of republican Rome by Tommaso Laureti and contain five statues of Captains
of the Church (Marcantonio Colonna, Alessandro Farnese, Carlo Barberini,
Gianfrancesco Aldobrandini, and Tommaso Rospigliosi).

In
the center of the Hall of the Triumphs of Emilius Paulus over Perseus is
the famous bronze Spinarius (boy with a thorn), of the late Hellenistic
period. Also a statue of Camillus from the Augustan period.

In
the Hall of the She-Wolf are frescos of subjects from Roman history by
Giacomo Ripanda, and the famous bronze Wolf of the Capitol.
On the end wall are fragments of the Arch of Augustus
(The Fasti Consulares).

In
the Hall of the Geese, the main interest is a delightful dog in verde
ranocchia. In the Hall of the Eagles is a wonderful painting
by G. F. Romanelli called Solomon and the Queen of Sheba; in the
Hall
of the Throne are tapestries of Romulus and Remus from the painting
by Rubens.

The
Hall of Hannibal has frescoes attributed to Jacopo Ripanda of the early
16th century.

Palazzo
dei Conservatori Museum: In the Hall of Modern Pomps are
lists of magistrates of the city from 1649 upward. The Gallery of
Orti Lamiani contains sculptures found in the gardens of the Aelii Lamia.
Of interest is a Centaur's Head and Venus of the Esquiline
dating from the 1st century B.C. The Hall of Magistrates is named
for the two statues dating from the beginning of the 4th century, Magistrates
Conducting the Opening Ceremonies of the Games in the Circus.
There is a wonderful Ionic funeral stele of a young girl with a dove
dating from the 6th century B.C.

There
are two Halls of Christian Monuments that contain epigraphs, sarcophagi,
sculptures, and inscriptions. In the Hall of the Fireplace, there
are Etruscan bucchero pottery from the 7th and 6th centuries B.C. and terracotta
antefixes from Taranto dating from the 5th and 4th centuries B.C.

The
two Castellani Halls contain the Castellani collection. In the Hall
of the Bronzes there are remains of the colossal statue of Amiternum
inlaid with silver ornamentation (1st century A.D.). Finally, the
Hall of the Gardens of Maecenas contains sculptures from the garden of
Maecenas, notably, a fighting Hercules and a relief with a dancing
Maenad.

New
Wing: The New Wing contains sculptures discovered in the
most recent excavations and some remains from the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus.

New
Museum: The rooms of the New Museum contain architectural
decorations, urns, shelves, sarcophagi, small statuary, bases of columns,
a statue of Priapus, candelabra bases, and a relief of a struggle between
tigers and bulls from the basilica of Junius Bassus.

Capitoline
Picture Gallery: This Gallery consists essentially of pictures
from the Sacchetti and Pio Collections, works by Italian and foreign painters
from the 16th to 18th centuries. Of interest are the Holy Family
by Dosso Dossi, Portrait of a Woman With Attributes of St. Margaret
by Girolamo Savoldo; The Baptism of Christ by Titian; Romulus
and Remus Suckled by the Wolf by Rubens; the Ascension by Barnaba
da Modena; Caravaggio's erotic depiction of a young nude St.John
the Baptist (see photo);
Diana the Huntress by Cavalier D'Arpino;
and the Gypsy Fortune-teller by a young Caravaggio.

Centrale
Montemartini, Via Ostiense, 106. Tel. 06/574.8030. Admission
charge. Tues.-Fri. 10am-6pm, Sat.-Sun. until 7pm. This art
museum contains the overflow of artwork from the Capitoline Museums and
is displayed among 20th century hardware in a former electric power plant.

Museum
of the Walls, Via di Porta S. Sebastiano, 18. Tel. 757.52.84. Weekdays
9am-12:30pm; Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Thurs. also 4pm-7pm. Closed Monday.
Admission charge. This is open mainly for education purposes and
uses models to illustrate the historical and architectural development
of the monument.

Museum
of Roman Ships, Fiumicino, Tel. 601.10.89, 9am-1pm and 2pm-5pm; Sun.
and Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission charge. This museum was opened in 1979
as a result of 20 years' work by archaeologist Valnea Santa Maria Scrinari.
Shows the excavation and restoration of various Roman merchant vessels
plus a fishing boat.

Museum
of the Near East, Via Palestro, 63. Visitable upon request.
Tel. 495.36.72. There are two sections to this museum: the
Egyptian section and the Oriental Archaeology section. Contains funerary
furnishings from Antinoe, material from the Pharaonic period found at Thebes,
architectural fragments from excavations of the Palestinian site of Ramat
Rahel and a collection of ceramic fragments from the excavations at Tell
Mardikh Ebla.

National
Museum of Oriental Art, Via Merulana, 248. Tel. 735.946. Weekdays 9am-2pm;
Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission charge. Contains pottery from the
Italian archaeological excavations in the region of Sistan of the 3rd millennium
B.C., bronze objects from Luristan (Iran), Islamic Art, Chinese, Japanese
and Korean pottery and Buddhist bronzes. Of special interest is a
funeral relief that is an example of Palmyrena art of the 3rd century,
an Islamic ceramic plate, glazed with epigraphic decoration from Eastern
Iran, and a bottle in gold and silver with scenes of bacchanal from Iran's
Sasanide period.

Museum
of Origins, University, Faculty of Letters, Tel. 499.16.53. For study
purposes only. Founded in 1930 by Prof. U. Rellini with material
collected by or given to him on permanent loan by the Superintendent of
Antiquities.

Italian
Section: Of interest are animal remains from the Pleistocene
period, including the skull of a prehistoric elephant found during the
excavation of Via dei Fori Imperiali. Also material from Ponte S.
Pietro, with flask-shaped vases.

Prehistoric
and Protohistoric Section: Material from excavations conducted
by the Paleo-ethnological Institute of the University, representing North
African cultures from the Upper Paleolithic to the Protodynastic periods,
rock art of the Libyan Sahara, and material found from the excavations
of Afghanistan, Sistan and Persian Azerbaijan, Rumania, and Maltese pottery
and stone tolls.

(L.
Pigorini) Prehistoric and Ethnographic National Museum, Via Lincoln,
1. Tel. 591.07.02. Weekdays 9am-2pm; Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission
charge. Opened in 1962. Split into two sections: Ethnographic
section on the first floor, and the Prehistoric and Protohistoric section
on the second floor. Contains ancient bones and statues, skulls of
pre-Neanderthal type from Saccopastore, and many rooms of antiquities.

National
Museum of Rome(Museo Nazionale Romano), V.le E. De Nicola,
79. Tel. 488.08.56. Tues. to Sat., 9am-2pm; Sun. 9am-1pm. Admission
charge includes entrance to Palazzo Altemps and Palazzo Massimo alle Terme.
This museum is housed in the Baths that Diocletian had built between the
last years of the 3rd century and the beginning of the 4th century A.D.
Of interest is a wonderful statue of a Young Girl from Anzio of
the first Hellenistic age; three sarcophagi with representation of the
Three
Graces; a fragment of a Hebrew sarcophagus figuring the seven-branch
candlestick; and the Tomb of Gaius Sulpicius Platorinus and his
family, that was unearthed during the building of the Tiber embankment
between Ponte Sisto and the Farnesina.

Little
Cloister of the Certosa: Of interest is a statue of a Young
Roman Girl Portrayed as Diana from Ostia, 1st century A.D.; Venus
and Love in a Procession of Nereids mosaic; a small green basalt statue
of A Young Athlete from the Palatine; the Ludovisi Throne;
a statue of the Young Dionysus;
The Discus Thrower; the
Head of Hadrian from the excavation carried out for the construction
of Stazione Termini; Niobide Wounded of the 4th century B.C.; and
a bronze statue of A Young Man Leaning on a Spear.

Palazzo
Massimo alle Terme, Largo Villa Peretti, 2. Tel. 06/489.035.01.
Tues.-Sun. 9am-7pm. Admission charge includes admission to Museo
delle Terme di Diocleziano at Piazza della Repubblica. This palace
exhibits parts of the antiquities collections belonging to the National
Museum of Rome, including fine mosaics and paintings that decorated ancient
Rome's villas and palazzos. Of interest, the
fresco depicting
a lush garden in bloom that came from the villa at Livia that the wife
of Emperor Augustus owned outside of Rome.

SCIENCE
MUSEUMS

Museum
of Anthropology, Campus, Faculty of Physics and Animal and Natural
Sciences, Dept. of Animal and Human Biology, Tel. 499.12.22/494.04.23.
9am-1pm. Admission charge. Founded by Giuseppe Sergi, it is the center
for teaching and research into the natural history of man and the primates.
It contains fossilized skull fragments from a Neanderthal man found in
Rome in 1929 and 1935, better known as the "Saccopastore Man". Also,
the skeleton of the so-called "Maiella Man", that is a homo sapiens traced
back to pre-neolithic times. Many other specimens and anthropological
collections are included in this museum.

Paleontological
and Lithomineralogical Collections of the Institute of Geology, Largo
S. Susanna, 13. Tel. 460.982. Visits are allowed only for purposes
of study and must be previously authorized by the Direction. These
collections were started by the Comitato Geologico, that moved them to
Rome from Florence in 1873 to the Ufficio Geologico, whose name is now
Servizio Geologico d'Italia. These collections include rocks and
fossils; mollusks of the Pliocene and Quaternary periods; the Curioni collection
of Lombardy fossils; the Cambrian fossils of Sardinia; and lithologic collections
of the Alps, Elba, Campania, Latium, Abruzzi, Calabria, Puglia, and the
Apuan Alps.

Municipal
Museum of Zoology, via Aldrovandi, 18. Tel. 873.486. Daily 9am-1pm
(the ticket for the Zoological Garden is valid here). Closed Mondays. Admission
charge. This museum opened in 1932. The material takes up 18
large rooms and several smaller ones arranged in display cases. Among
the exhibits are stuffed mammals and birds taxidermied in natural positions.
There is a small area devoted to reptiles, amphibians, and fish.
Some of the stuff specimens include a lynx from the western Alps, the "nun"
seal from Cape Teulada, ibex from the Alps and the Pyrenees and the okapi,
a donation from 1905. The "osteology" room contains large skeletons
of dolphins, whales, and globocephalics from the Tyrrhenian coast.

Museum
of Zoology of the Department of Animal and Human Biology, viale dell'Universita,
32. Tel. 495.82.54/495.82.59. Opening times on request. Admission
charge. This museum used to be the Institute of Zoology with rich
collections of vertebrates and invertebrates, some of remarkable interest.
Some are displayed in a showcase some 48 metres long, while the locked
metal showcases contain collections of fish, amphibians and reptiles from
the Mediterranean, skulls of mammals and micromammals, invertebrates of
all orders, in hundreds of thousands of examples, with particular reference
to fauna of caves and soil. The library has 25,000 volumes.

Museum
of Zoology, Second Section, collection of the ex-National Institute
of Entomology (INE), via Catone, 34. Tel. 311.856. Opening times on request.
Admission charge. This museum has a huge collection of several million
insects, butterflies, and coleoptera in particular. These collections
are basically for study purposes only and are kept in entomological boxes
in locked cabinets that do not allow for public display. Their entomological
library has some 15,000 volumes.

Museum
of Comparative Anatomy, Campus, Faculty of Physics and Natural Sciences,
via Alfonso Borelli, 50 (ground floor). Tel. 490.123/492.250. 9am-1pm
on days when the University is open. Admission charge. The
initial museum dates back to the natural history collection of Pius VII
who, in 1804, founded the chair of "Historia Naturalis" and of Mineralogy
at the Archiginnasio. When Rome became Italy's capital, the Institute
of Comparative Anatomy was founded and given a large part of the collection
the present museum boasts. It contains skeletons and anatomical preparations
of vertebrates; teaching specimens in Comparative Anatomy; instruments
of microscopic and histologic anatomy; and large cetaceans. Currently,
the museum is part of the Department of Animal and Human Biology of the
University of Rome.

Museum
of Physics, Campus, Faculty of Mathematics, Physics and Natural Sciences
(new building, third floor). Tel. 49914/334. Opening times to be arranged
upon request. Admission charge. The museum contains equipment used
for research and activities in the Physics Institute of Rome and teaching
physics experiments.

Museum
of Mineralogy, Campus, Faculty of Mathematics, Physics and Natural
Sciences. Department of Earth Sciences. Tel. 499.17.88. Open Friday 9am-1pm
on request. Admission charge. This is the oldest museum in
the Faculty of Mathematics, Physics, and Natural Science. It was
set up after Pius VII's letter of 1804 "Uberes dum menti nostrae", referring
to a vast collection of natural findings put together by the Archiginnasio
della Sapienza. The museum was first arranged by P. G. Gismondi,
who was its first director. In 1850, the museum got a positive turn
by acquiring the Spada collection, by the pontifical government for 20,000
roman "scudi"; the collection was destined for the "Sapienza" museum.
In 1873, it took the present name of the Mineralogy Museum and G. Struver
sorted and catalogued every single piece, giving the museum the shape it
has maintained to the present day. Some of the specimens are catalogued
under the following classes: native elements, sulfurs, arsenides
and such, sulfur salts, aloids, oxides and hydroxides, oxygenate salts
(carbonates, sulphates, phosphates, silicates, etc.), and organic compounds.
The Latium collection is particularly noticeable with pieces of great interest
to science. It was re-opened to the public in 1985. Some extraordinary
specimens include: the tourmaline from Elba (some 22-color crystals,
pink and green, on a pegmatic matrix); the orange-pink topaz from Brazil;
a transparent emerald from Columbia; a gold nugget from Jubdo (Ethiopia)
weighing 1,250 grams; the geminate cinnabar crystals from Honan; the blue
topaz from the Urals and the rain of olivinic and bronzite "condriti" (61
pieces) from Bur-Gheluai (Somalia). Note that some gem specimens
alternate being on display at any given time.

Museum
of Geology, Campus, Institute of Geology and Paleontology. Tel.
499.12.90. Opening times upon request. Admission charge. A
collection of rocks and fossils brought together by Giuseppe Ponzi (1805-1885),
who was a Roman doctor and naturalist and who held the first chair in Geology,
instituted by Pius IX in 1864. The museum shows over 5,000 specimens
displayed in 10 showcases, while another 2,000 are kept in drawers for
lack of space. There are rocks formed by the cooling of the magma.
Two remarkable collections complete the exhibit. The first is known
as the "Belli Collection", was donated by Piux IX and includes examples
of the finest decorative stones. The other collection, the "Dodwell
Collection", is made up of 247 specimens coming from ancient Roman monuments.

Museum
of Merchandising, Faculty of Economic and Commercial Sciences, Institute
of Merchandising, via Castro Laurenziano, 9. Tel. 495.49.98. Visits on
request. Admission charge. This museum contains over 9,000
items. It was started in 1906. Among the raw materials are
bits of coal from all over the world. Also, processing silk from
worm to fabric are on display.

Museum
of History of Medicine, viale dell'Universita, 34a. Tel. 499.14.45.
Weekdays 9am-1pm on request. Admission charge. This museum is attached
to the Istituto di Storia della Medicina and was formed in 1938 under the
guidance of Adalberto Pazzini. There are nine sections to this museum:
primitive medicine (I); early civilization (II); Classical period (III);
Middle Ages (IV); Renaissance (V); Seventeenth Century (VI); Eighteenth
Century (VII); Nineteenth Century (VIII); and reconstructions of medieval
and Renaissance scenes (alchemist's and chemist's laboratories).

Botanical
Garden, largo Cristina di Svezia, 24. Tel. 686.41.93. Monday
to Friday 9am-3pm, Sat. 9am-11am, Sundays and Holidays closed. Permanent
Exhibition. Guided tours by appointment only. Admission charge. The
"Orto Botanico", located between Porta Settimiana and Porta Angelica, was
set up long ago. In 1278, in Rome, there already was a "Viridarium
novum", described by contemporary writers as a place rich in plants and
fountains, in which medical herbs were also grown, under the supervision
of Simone da Genova, chief doctor of Nicholas III. This garden, called
"Giardino dei Semplici", was later enlarged and enriched by Nicholas V
in 1447; here, Roman professors of Medicine took the material for their
practical lessons. By the end of the 15th century, Pope Innocent
VIII moved it from its original location (in part of the present Piazza
San Pietro) to the Vatican Gardens, where stands today the Casina di Pio
IV. After a period of great neglect, Alexander VII destined to it
an area, the Fontana della Acqua Paola. In 1823, Leo XII opened a
new botanical garden in the gardens of the Salviati Palace, in Via della
Lungara, and later it was transferred to the Friars' garden in San Lorenzo
di Panisperna. Finally, in 1883, the Duke of Casigliano, Tommaso
Corsini, gave his villa and his park to the Italian government and partially
to the Municipality of Rome. The palace now houses the Accademia
dei Lincei and the park is the present home of the Botanical Garden.
This garden is one of the three most important Italian botanical gardens,
both for its size (about 12 hectares) and the number of species (about
8,000). It has an interesting collection of perfectly acclimatized
palms, conifers, leguminous and liliaceous plants, notable for their rarity,
age, and provenance. There are also five greenhouses, covering 2,800
sq. m., in which are kept the more delicate species, a fine collection
of orchids, ferns, and succulents. In the higher part of the garden,
there is a remnant of the ancient forest that once covered the slopes of
the Janiculum, made up of oaks, century-old beeches, ash, and other species
typical of the Mediterranean evergreen oak forest. A wonderful place
to visit.

Herbarium,
Campus, Faculty of Mathematics, Physics and Natural Sciences; Dept. of
Plant Biology (2nd floor), Tel. 495.22.37. Visitable upon request only.
In the early 1800s, every scholar had a private herbarium for their research.
The University Herbarium was set up by Giuseppe de Notaris, who held the
chair of Botany from 1872. After his passing, the chair passed to
Nicola Pedicino who introduced the collections of P. Sanguinetti and E.
Florini Mazzanti. After Pedicino's passing, the chair went to Romualdo
Pirotta, who expanded the collection considerably. At present, the
collection has over 1,000,000 items, and is one of the biggest herbariums
in Europe. The collection is exhibited in two rooms that are divided
into four sections: the Roman herbarium, the general herbarium, the
Cesati herbarium, and the Montelucci herbarium.

Museum
of Paleontology, Campus, Department of Earth Sciences (2nd floor).
Tel. 499.12.44. Every day except Sun., 9am-1pm. Admission charge.
This museum consists of two rooms and a restoring lab. The first
room contains fossils of invertebrates. Some of the showcases illustrate
the animal and vegetable organisms that have taken over from each other
in the last 600 million years, giving for each group information about
system, stratum, and ecology. Two showcases are devoted to paleobotany,
from the first forms of life, unicellular bacteria and algae, to the large
Pteridophites of the Carboniferous up to the Angiosperms or plants with
flowers that began in the Jurassic and spread through the Cretacean until
they replaced the Earth's flora in the Cenozoic period. The second is devoted
to vertebrates such as fish, amphibia, birds, and reptiles with particular
reference to Quaternary mammals from Latium and the Mediterranean area.
There is a wonderful complete specimen of a Hippopotamus antiquus here
also.

MEDIEVAL
AND MODERN MUSEUMS

Doria
Pamphilj Gallery, Palazzo Doria Pamphili, Piazza del Collegio Romano,
Tel. 679.43.65. Fri.-Wed. 10am-5pm, closed Tuesdays. Admission charge.
There is a separate admission charge for the private apartments.
This Gallery is housed in the palace if the same name, that sits on Via
del Corso, but its entrance is in the Piazza del Collegio Romano.
The Renaissance palace passed from the Della Rovere family to the Aldobrandinis
in 1601 and then, when Olimpia Aldobrandini married Camillo Pamphilj senior
in 1647, to the latter. The most notable part of this magnificent
palace is that was worked on by the architect Gabriele Valvassori between
1731 and 1734. He enriched the facade on the Corso, and closed the
upper loggia of Bramante's courtyard to obtain four wings. One wing
was turned into the Gallery of Mirrors. In 1651, a breve by Giambattista
Pamphilj, elected pope as Innocent X, sanctioned the birth of the Gallery.
The collection at that time already included the famous portrait of the
Pope commissioned from Velasquez in 1650. The direct Pamphilj family
line ended in 1760 and the Doria Pamphilj branch inherited the palace.
The Gallery was declared indivisible and inalienable in 1871, along with
the other ex-trustee collections. On the days the building is open,
it is also possible to visit the private and public rooms in the palace.
Again, this Gallery is filled with an overabundance of paintings.
Of interest are: Entrance - Landscape with the temple
of the Sybil at Tivoli; a wood landscape with water plants and cliffs;
and Landscape with the waterfall at Tivoli
by Jan Frans van Bloemen.
Wing
1 - Return of the Prodigal Son by Jacopo and Francesco Bassano
the Younger; Salome With the Head of St. John the Baptist by Titian;
Portrait
of Andrea Navagero and Agostin Beazzano by Raphael; Rest During
the Flight Into Egypt by Caravaggio. Aldobrandi Room I
- St. John the Baptist in the desert
by Guercino. Wing II
-
Madonna
with Child by Ludovico Carracci;
Samson by Guercino;
The
Holy Family by Sassoferrato; The Last Supper
by Scarsellino.
Room
II -
Christ Carrying the Cross and St. Veronica by Niccolo
Frangipane;
Earthly Paradise by Jacopo Bassano.
Room
III -
Holy Family with S.S. Zachary, Elizabeth and John in Glory
Adored by S.S. Francis and Bernardino by Garofalo.
Room IV -
Levantine
Harbour by Arnold Frans Rubens;
View of Rome with the Tiber and
Aventine and View of Rome with the Convent of St. Peter in Chains,
both by Hendrik Frans van Lint. Room V - Earthly Paradise
and Original Sin by Jan Brueghel the Elder; Storm At Sea
by
Tempesta. Cabinet I - Landscapes by Herman van Swanewelt
and Jan Brueghel the Elder.
Wing III - Portrait
of Giovanna of Aragon, a copy of a Raphael; Jacob Wrestling with
the Angel by Stefano Maderno.
Cabinet II - Portrait
of Innocent X by Velasquez;
Bust of Innocent X by Gian Lorenzo
Bernini. Wing IV
- Landscapes by Claude Lorrain, Annibale
Carracci, Francesco Albani, Salvator Rosa, Antonio Tempesta, Gaspare Vanvitelli,
and G. Lazzoni. This Gallery is truly a plethora of delight.
If you love art, you will get your fill in this Gallery. A must-see!

Gallery
of the St. Luke Academy, Piazza dell'Accademia di San Luca, 77. Tel.
678.92.43. Gallery open Mon., Wed., Fri. 10am-1pm; last Sunday of month
10am-1pm. Library open weekdays 9am-1pm. Closed Sat. Historical Archive
open Tues. 5pm-7pm, Wed. 10am-noon. Admission charge. This Gallery
was born of the University of Painters, Miniaturists, and Embroiderers.
The statutes of this university, that had already existed in Rome for quite
some time, were renewed during the papacy of Sixtus IV (December 17, 1748).
The original parchment is kept in the Academy's archives. Neither
the sculptors (who had split off from the stone masons in 1539 following
a brief from Paul III issued at the request of Michelangelo) nor architects,
however, belonged to the university. Moved by a desire to restore
the arts while giving prestige to the artists' calling and establishing
respected training courses for young people, the painter Girolano Muziano
sponsored the creation of an Academy that would combine the three figurative
arts, welcoming painters, sculptors, and architects who had achieved proven
renown. The proposal was accepted by Gregory XIII, whose brief of
October 15, 1577 created the "Roman Academy of Fine Arts", assigning it
a religious congregation under the protection of St. Luke. In an
effort to facilitate the work of this congregation, Sixtus V deeded it
the Church of St. Martina in "tribus foris" in 1588, at which point the
church took on the names of St. Luke and St. Martina. To get an idea
of the prestige enjoyed by the Academy during its centuries of activity,
one need merely scan the lists of its members, both Italian and foreign,
from the end of the 16th century to the present day, that has included
Borromini, Poussin, Reni, Guercino, The Carracci, Albani, Caravaggio, Giacomo
della Porta, Martino Longhi, Carlo Maderno, Robert Adam, Valadier, G. L.
Bernini, Pietro da Cortona, Carlo Rainaldi, "Baciccia", Charles Le Brun,
Preziado de la Vega, etc. Of importance is the "Incipit" from the
statutes of the Painters University; St. Luke Painting the Virgin
by Raphael; the breathtaking 3D painting Stairway and triumphal arch
from a loggia; the sculpture Socrates saving Alcibiades during the
Battle of Portidea by Antonio Canova; Andromeda by Cavalier
d'Arpino; a fragment of a fresco by Raphael with a putto holding a festoon;
The
Announcement to the Shepherds by Jacopo Bassono; a funeral mask of
Michelangelo; Madonna and Child with Angel Musicians by Anthony
Van Dyck; Venus and Love by Guercino; The Birth of St. John the
Baptist by Baciccia, a sketch for the painting that is in the Church
of S. Maria in Campitelli. This Gallery is a must see for those who
enjoy wonderful works of art.

National
Gallery of Ancient Art, Palazzo Barberini, via Quattro Fontana, 13.
Tel. 06/482.41.84. Tues.-Sat. 9am-7pm, Sun. 9am-1pm, closed Tuesdays. Admission
charge; children under 17 and seniors over 60 free. The Palazzo Barberini
was designed by Maderno, and built on the site of the previous Villa Sforza,
for Matteo Barberini who became pope as Urban VIII. On Maderno's
death in 1629, Gian Lorenzo Bernini took control of the construction.
One of his collaborators was Francesco Borromini whose hand is recognizable
in certain architectural details, and in the design of the curving staircase
on the right, corresponding to the rectangular main staircase on the opposite
side that was designed by Bernini. The latter is also responsible
for the central hall, two floors high, and the adjacent oval room with
its harmonious classical proportions that takes up a typical theme of Bernini,
the elliptical plan. The great hall was decorated by Pietro da Cortona
who worked on it from 1633 to 1639; the allegorical theme, derived from
the poet Francesco Bracciolini, centers on the Triumph of Providence
and was intended to exalt the glory of the papal family.

In
the large entrance hall and adjacent side-room of the piano nobile are
17th century busts, among the notable an outstanding
portrait of Urban
VIII by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The Barberini collection is arranged
in chronological order in the rooms that follow. Of note are 13th
century painted crosses, including a painted crucifix by Bonaventura
Berlinghieri; a 15th century work by Filippo Lippi called
Madonna and
Child; and the outstanding painting on wood of the Madonna with
Saints Paul and Francis by Antoniazzo Romano. Room V
- Tuscan paintings of the early 16th centurry, including the Holy Family
by Andrea Del Sarto and a Madonna and Child by Domenico Beccafumi.
Room
VI - The ceiling fresco is by Andrea Camasci. Important works
include La Fornarina by Raphael Sanzio, and a small
Madonna and
Child by Giulio Romano. Room VII - The ceiling
of this magnificent room was painted by Andrea Sacchi and shows
Divine
Wisdom. On display are works of Northern Italian and Venetian
painters from the 16th century. Some of the gallery's more important
works are here, including Lorenzo Lotto's Mystical Marriage of
St. Catherine; Tintoretto's Christ and the Adultress;
Titian's
Venus and Adonis, and two sketches by Greco. Just
past the chapel in an adjoining side-room is a wonderful collection of
Flemish works from the 15th to 17th centuries. More important is
the portrait of Henry VIII by Hans Holbein. The next room
contains paintings by Marcello Venusti, Siciolante da Sermoneta, and portraits
by Pulzone and Federico Zuccari. On the ceiling are the Deeds
of Joseph, a work by Baldassarre Croce. These are followed by
works from the Bolognese school of the second half of the 16th century,
including Annibale Carracci's Tabernacle with Mary and Saints.
Exquisite!

The
next room is devoted to Caravaggio, that include
Judith cutting off
the head of Holofernes and Narcissus.
The rooms that follow
exhibit works by Saraceni, Gentileschi, and some paintings by the Bambocciante
School. Among the Neopolitan 17th century works are paintings by
Salvatore Rosa, Mattia Preti, Massimo Stanzone, Bernardo Cavallini, etc.
The final rooms are devoted to 17th century Roman painters, with some works
by N. Poussin, Guido Reni, Lanfranco, Pietro da Cortona, Albani, and Guercino.

On
the second floor, other than the rooms of the so-called 18th century apartment,
numerous rooms contain the National Gallery's exhibition of 18th century
art. There is a large room decorated with
scenes from the lives
of the American Indians. Toward the end of the exhibition are
rooms containing Venetian and German 18th century glass, pieces of Venetian
furniture, a collection of Italian porcelain, pieces of embroidery with
biblical scenes, 18th century Chinese porcelain, and the last room is devoted
to Castelli ware, a rich collection of plates and painted tiles.
The collection of 18th century dress is very interesting.

Colonna
Gallery, Via della Pilotta, 17. Tel. 679.43.62, Sept.-July, Sat. 9am-1pm
only. Admission charge. Closed month of August. The Colonna
Gallery is housed in Palazzo Colonna, that fills the large block stretching
from Piazza SS. Apostoli to Via della Pilotta, that bridges with four arches
before continuing as far as the garden of the Villa, the main entrance
is in Via XXIV Maggio. It dates back to the 15th century and Pope
Martin V Collona and was rebuilt in 1700. The Gallery was founded
in 1654 by Cardinal Girolamo I Colonna who entrusted its construction to
the architect Antonio Del Grande, who put the roof on in 1665. In
1671, after the death of Del Grande, Girolamo Fontana took over the building
of this palace. The decoration of the ceilings by the painters G.
Coli, G. Gherardi, Sebastiano Ricci, and G. Chiari was completed in 1702.
In 1703, the Gallery was opened by Filippo Colonna. This Gallery
contains massive collections of masterpieces in many rooms. Among
the noteworthy are: Entrance Hall - St. Benedict
of Norcia by Jacopo Chimenti. Anteroom - a Crucifixion
from the school of F. Barocci, and Magdalen at the Sepulchre, a
copy from Caravaggio. Room of the Column of War - ceiling
frescoes by G. B. Chiari showing the Apotheosis of Marcantonio Colonna
II; Madonna and Child, St. Peter and donor by Palma il Vecchio; Venus,
Cupid and Satyr by Angelo Bronzino; Narcissus at the Well by
J. Tintoretto. Larger Room - Supper in the House
of Simon by F. Bassano the Younger;
St. John the Baptist in a cave
by
Salvator Rosa; Martyrdom of St. Emerenziana by Guercino;
St.
Francis in prayer with two angels
by G. Reni. Room of Landscapes
-
many landscapes by G. Dughet; Apollo and Daphne by a follower of
N. Poussin. Room of the Apotheosis of Martin V - on the ceiling
in the center is the Apotheosis of Martin V by B. Luti;
Virgin
after the Annunication, the Archangel Gabriel by Guercino;
St. Elizabeth
and the infant St. John the Baptist by A. Bronzino. Throne Room
- portrait of Marcantonio Colonna II by S. Pulzone. Room of
the Primitives - Throned Madonna with the Child Blessing
by
B. Vivarini. This list doesn't even touch on what is housed in this
Gallery.

National
Gallery in Palazzo Corsini, via della Lungara, 10. Tel. 654.23.23.
Tues-Fri. 9am-7pm, Mon. and Sat. 9am-2pm. Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission
charge. The Palazzo Corsini is typical of Ferdinando Fuga's work,
built between 1732-36 on the site of the old Riario Palace, founded in
the 15th century and known, among other things, for having been chosen
for her home by Queen Christina of Sweden. Taking the main entrance,
you go directly into an atrium containing Roman sarcophagi and marble busts
of personages and divinities from classical antiquity in keeping with 18th
century taste for the antique. There are two majestic flights of
stairs; on the landing are busts and sarcophagi from which a central flight
of stairs leads to the vestibule. This huge hall, originally designed
for a music room or ballroom, has an orchestra gallery. In the center
is an exquisite marble group by John Gibson called Psyche borne by winged
Zephyrs. Also of interest is a dancing Faun. There
are two allegorical statues of Fishing and Hunting, as well
as statues of Vesta and Vulcan by Pietro Tenerani. Room
I contains Flemish paintings; Room II contains
works by L. Van Uden, J. Brueghel the Elder, C. Berents, A. Bruegal, P.
P. Ruebens, A. Van Dyck, etc.; Room III contains paintings
from the Italian 16th century by Caravaggio, Gentileschi, Saraceni, Serodine,
Borgianni, Bambocciante painters and landscape artists. Room
IV contains works by foreign painters Valentin, Tournier, Bigot,
Honthorst, and Schers. Room V is the bedroom of Queen Christina
of Sweden with 16th century frescoes. Room VI
has more Italian paintings of the 17th century - Baciccio, Viterbese, Raffaello
and Raffaellino, Brandi, P. F. Mola, Cigoli, and Dolci. Room
VII contains the works of G. Reni, L. Carracci, G. Lanfranco, Guercino,
Sassoferrato, and Schedoni. Of note is G. Reni's Salome with the
head of John the Baptist. Room VIII has the
works of S. Compagno, Spagnoletto, Luca Giodano, Salvatore Rosa, Mattia
Preti, and Cavallino. As you can see, there is a lot to see in this
gallery.

Keats-Shelley
Memorial House, Piazza di Spagna, 26. Tel. 678.42.35. Winter 9am-1pm;
2:30pm-5:30pm. Summer 9am-1pm; 3pm-6pm. Closed Sat. and Sun. Admission
charge. The Memorial was founded in 1903 by a group of English and
American
admirers of the two poets under the presidency of Ambassador Sir Rennel
Rodd, and was inaugurated in the presence of King Victor Emanuel III in
1909. The foundation, that possesses an important specialized library
much frequented and continually added to, also publishes a bulletin and
a journal. It is situated in the apartment that Keats lived at the
foot of the Spanish Steps and where he died on February 23rd. The
various rooms contain manuscripts, pictures, sculptures, prints, drawings,
and various curios connected not only with Shelley and Keats, but also
with Byron and Leigh Hunt. The walls are covered with shelves and
cupboards containing books on the English Romantic movement and on relations
between Italy and Great Britain. In the collection, there are fragments
of original manuscripts, an autograph felter of Oscar Wilde, watercolors
by Joseph Severn who lived in this house with Keats, and a death mask of
Keats.

National
Gallery of Modern Art, viale delle Belle Arti (Valle Giulia), 131.
Tel. 322.981. Weekdays 9am-2pm, Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Closed Monday.
Admission charge. In 1881, a decree of the minister Guido Baccelli
instituted a Gallery of Modern Art in Rome. The result was Palazzo
delle Esposizioni in Via Nazionale, designed by Pio Piacentini when the
first national exhibition in the new capital was held in 1883. In
1911, it was decided to transfer the gallery to the central building of
the Universal Exposition in the dell of Valle Giulia, designed and built
by Cesare Bazzani. Of interest:
Room I - Large View
of Rome by Vittorio Grassi and another by Umberto Prencipe.
Room
II - Shipwreck from "The Tempest" of Shakespeare by the
English painter George Rommey;
Sketch for the Tomb of Vittorio Alfieri
by
A. Canova. Room III - the famous Psyche unconscious,
Bust
of Princess Wolkonski, and statue of Pellegrino Rossi by Pietro
Tenerani and the magnificent
Florence from the Boboli Gardens by
Giovanni Migliara. Room IV - devoted to the romantic
movement represented by Francesco Hayez, Bather and The Sicilian Vespers
Giovanni Carnavali (Il Piccio) with biblical scenes and portraits and a
few paintings by Massimo d'Azeglio. Rooms V and VI - devoted
to Filippo Palizzi. Large Hall (formerly Rooms VII-VIII and
XIX) - contain The Terrace by Eduardo Dalbona and Banks
of the Seine by Federico Rossano. Also,
Piazza San Marco
by M. Cammarano. I forget what room G. Klimt's
The Three Ages
is on exhibit, but it is magnificent. Room IX - contains
paintings of the Palizzi brothers while
Room X contains works
of Filippo Palizzi and Bernardo Celentano. Room XI contains
paintings on historical subjects; of note is Tasso and Eleonora d'Este
by Domenico Morelli and Marco Polo before the Gran Khan of the Tartars
by
Tranquillo Cremona. Rooms XII and XIII are dedicated
to Domenico Morelli. Room XIV contains historical paintings
of the second half of the 19th century. Room XV was not open.
Room
XVI houses works by Faruffini and Antonio Fontanesi, that include
Woman
at the Fountain and Diana Bathing. Room XVII is
devoted to Medardo Rosso who transferred into his sculpture the new conceptions
of impressionism. Of note are Laughing Mask, The Go-Between,
and
Veiled
Woman. Room XVIII
contains works of artists belonging
to the 'divisonismo' school, so-called from the optical theory of the division
of colors into their elements: this corresponds to the French Pointilliste
school. Among the noteworthy are At the Barrier by Giovanni
Segantini and
Dahlias by Gaetano Previati. Room XIX -
this room is now part of the Large Hall.
Rooms XX and XXI
were not open for viewing due to restoration.
Room XXII -
in the space between Rooms XX and XXIV are works by foreign artists such
as D. G. Rossetti, P. A. Besnard, Luigi Gioli, and of note is The Whistle
of Steam by Adolfo Tommasi.

The
rooms that follow house the collection of pictures and sculptures from
the first four decades of the 20th century, some 1,500 pieces. A
limited offering of roughly 400 works are on display at any one time, however.
Among the most important works are the futuristic pieces in the Balla collection.
Of special interest are two metaphysical works by Carra and Morandi, and
Cezanne's Le Cabanon de Jourdan. This Gallery has a lot to
see if you are a modern art lover.

Canonica
Museum, Viale Pietro Canonica, Villa Borghese. Tel. 844.95.33.
Tues. to Sun. 9am-1:30pm. Tues. and Thurs. also 4pm-7pm. Admission charge.
Mondays and whole month of August closed. This Museum was born from
the proposal made by Corrado Ricci to the Piedmontese sculptor to donate
a collection of his works to the city in exchange for the use of the place
that would later house the bequest. From 1922, the place in question
was an old building on the Palatine that was then demolished to allow for
excavations. In 1962, Canonica moved in the "Fortezzuola" in Villa
Borghese and stayed there until his death in 1956. The "Fortezzuola"
goes back to the 16th century and was probably originally a hunting lodge.
In the 17th century, it became the house of the Custodi del Gallinaro.
It came in an abandoned state to Pietro Canonica, who restored and enlarged
it at his own expense. At the front, there is the bronze group of
The
Alpino with his Mule. The sculptor's works (in marble and bronze,
plaster models, and casts) are arranged in seven rooms on the ground floor.
There are also others in the studio and the apartment that can only be
seen by special permission. Of great interest is P. Canonica's After
the Vow. Also:
Stations of the Cross, Christ Deposed, equestrian
statue of Simon Bolivar, equestrian statue of Feysal I King of Iraq, Christ
flagellated, Czar Nicholas II of Russia, and Edward VII of England.

Spada
Gallery, via Capodiferro, 3. Tel. 656.11.58.Weekdays 9am-2pm,
Wed. Thurs., Fri., Sat. also 3pm-7pm, Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission
charge. The Spada Gallery is located in the Palace of the same name,
once the property of Cardinale Girolamo Capodiferro (1501-1559), who, sometime
between 1548 and 1550, began to have it built on the site of pre-existing
buildings belonging to his family, by Bartolomeo Baronino, whose place
was taken at his death in 1554 by a certain Mastro Giulio who may in fact
have been Giulio Merisi da Caravaggio. After the death of Cardinal
Capodiferro, the palace passed to the Mignanelli family and was then bought
in 1632 by Cardinal Bernardino Spada (1594-1661) who, from the moment he
took up residence, decided not only to set up the basis of an art collection,
but also decided on a series of modifications employing various painters,
sculptors, and architects. Among the latter was Francesco Borromini
who created the famous Perspective Gallery. The main features of
the palace are the abundant decoration in stucco of the facade and the
courtyard. The palace, along with the Gallery, was bought by the
State in 1927. Since 1890, the building has housed the Council of
State. Of major interest are: David and Goliath by O.
Gentileschi;
Borea kidnapping Critia by F. Solimena; Meeting of Bacchus and
Ariadne by Giuseppe Chiari; St. Sebastian by F. di Lorenzo;
The Masaniello Revolt by E. Cerquozzi, and a David by Nicolas
Renier. There are many other fine works of art that should not be
missed in this Gallery either.

Pallavicini
Gallery and Casino dell'Aurora (Palazzo Pallavicini-Rospigliosi), Via
XXIV Maggio, 43, off Piazza del Quirinale. Tel. 06/482.72.24. First
day of the month, 10 am-6pm or by appointment. Special permission
can be obtained to visit this Gallery by applying to the Pallavicini Administration,
1b, via della Consulta. Tel. 474.40.19. Casino dell'Aurora open first
of every month from 10am-noon and 3pm-5pm. For visits on different times,
apply to the Management, vicolo del Mazzarino, 14. Tel. 475.12.24.
Entrance is free. This Gallery was formed on the wishes of Cardinal
Lazzaro Pallavicini of the well-known Genoese family. The Cardinal
took immense care in getting the collection together, adding to the works
from Genoa, that included the 13 pictures by Rubens, works acquired by
him and listed in the will that he instituted in favor of the Pallavicini-Rospigliosi
line. The Casino is located inside the perimeter wall on
the left with the famous Aurora fresco by Guido Reni on the ceiling
of the hall. The walls are hung with landscapes by Paul Bril. Among
the notable works in this Gallery are: Lust being vanquished by Chastity
by Lorenzo Lotto; Genius with the Horn of Plenty by Nicolas Poussin;
Christ
and the Twelve Apostles
by Peter Paul Rubens (the oldest nucleus of
the collection); and Original Sin by Domenichino. Many other
fine works are on display here and, if you are an art lover, you should
not miss this Gallery.

Museum
of Palazzo Venezia, via del Plebescito, 118. Cybo apartment and smaller
Palazzetto. Tel. 06/679.88.65. Tues.-Sat. 9am-2pm, Sun. 9am-1pm.
Closed Mondays. Admission charge; children under 18 free. A
very interesting museum, one of my favorites in Rome. The Palazzo
Venezia was designated as the seat of the museum in 1916 when it passed
into the possession of the Italian State after serving as the embassy of
the Venetian Republic and later as the Austrian Embassy. The inside
staircases are dark, bland, and cold, and make you think you are walking
through a medieval castle in a 1930s black-and-white movie. The construction
of this palace was begun in 1451 by Pope Paul II Barbo when he was the
titular Cardinal of the nearby Basilica di San Marco (one of the oldest
churches in Rome), and continued in 1464 when he was elected pontiff.
The work was later carried on by his nephew, Marco Barbo. The design
of the building, typical of 15th century palaces of Roman nobles, reveals
Tuscan influence, especially in the "loggia della benedizione" and in the
incomplete loggia overlooking the courtyard. When it became the property
of Lorenzo Cibo, nephew of Pope Innocent VIII, the building was enlarged
along via del Plebiscito. In the 18th century, Cardinal Querini had
the sentry walkway overlooking via degli Astalli covered in, creating the
so-called "Corridor of the Cardinals". In 1911, to provide space
for the monument to Victor Emanuel II on the far side of Piazza Venezia,
the entire "Greenhouse" of Paul II, that cornered on the main prospect,
was moved and reconstructed with all its stones, marble, and cloisters
on the left side of the building. The museum was partially opened
in 1921 and was finally organized in 1936. It houses paintings from
the 13th to 18th centuries, marble and carved-wood sculptures, bronzes,
terracotta, pottery, china, silver, cloths, seals, medals, glassware, tapestries,
and enamels. A very extensive collection indeed. One of the
"must sees" while in Rome.

Early
Middle Ages Museum, viale Lincoln, 3. Tel. 592.58.06/591.56.56. Weekdays
9am-2pm, Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission charge. This Museum was
founded in 1967 and contains archeological material from excavations and
collections relating to the period of time from late Antiquity to the high
Middle Ages (from the 4th to 13th centuries). Among the noteworthy
are marble portraits, including a fine head of a Byzantine emperor from
the Palatine Hill, material from the Longobard necropolis at Nocera
Umbra (Perugia) and Castel Trosino, the largest yet discovered
in central Italy. In the tombs of men, one finds arms such as swords,
spears, shields, daggers, arrows, helmets and breastplates, belt buckles
of gold, silver and inlaid iron. In the tombs of women, pins and
brooches for dresses, decorated with animal motifs in the typically Germanic
style. In both the male and female tombs, there are accessories like
gold crosses, glass and clay recipients, bronze bowls, combs, etc.
Of particular interest are some sword decorations in filigree and chased
gold and punched or engraved belt ornamentation, and chased gold brooches.
Also noteworthy are ivory coffers, one of which, perfectly preserved,
shows scenes from the Old Testament.
In
Rooms
IV and V are early medieval reliefs from the 7th to 10th centuries.
Of interest is the
altar front from Ara Coeli with peacocks facing
either side of the cross. Also, the rail of an ambo from the
church of Santo Stefano on the via Latina with an inscription dating from
the pontificate of Sergius II (844-847). There is also an important
relief showing the ascension into heaven of Alexander the Great.
Room
VI boasts the excavations at S. Cornelia near Rome. Room
VII has a collection of Coptic fabrics, including tablecloths,
tunics, shawls, and wall hangings, derived from burials in Christian and
Islamic Egypt.

National
Graphics Institute, via della Stamperia, 6. Tel. 679.89.58/679.49.16.
230 via della Lungara. Tel. 654.95.65/656.13.75. Daily 9am-1pm except Sun.
and Hol. Houses temporary exhibitions; entrance is free; schedules determined
at time of the event. This Institute was created in 1975 following
the merger of the National Center for Prints and the State Engraving Studio.
Since 1976, its assigned headquarters have been the Palazzo Poli.
The Center for Prints, headquartered on the second floor of the Villa della
Farnesina, was founded in 1985 by Prince Tommaso Corsini, who sold the
building on the Via della Lungara, along with its picture gallery, to the
State. Housed here is the National Collection. Among the more
venerable works are the 18th century Pio collection, the Fuga Collection,
and the Drusiani Collection, whose works include a large body of Tiepolo
prints. The collection contains more than 150,000 prints and designs.
One of the most important sketches on display is Leonardo da Vinci's Study
in draping and G. L. Bernini's Self-portrait. An interesting
place to visit if you have extra time.

Museum
of Folk Art and Traditions, Piazza Marconi, 8 (E.U.R.), Tel. 591.07.09.
Weekdays 9am-2pm. Sun. and Hol. 9am-1pm. Admission charge.
An initiative of Lamberto Loria, this museum was founded in 1906 in Florence.
In 1956, it was moved to a new site in Rome. Almost all of the materials
in the current collection were part of the exhibition organized in 1911
for the 50th anniversary of Italian Unification. During this event,
Loria's original collection was enriched by objects gathered from every
corner of Italy, that have been a part of the museum ever since.
Of note is a newborn's baptismal dress said to have magical powers, in
silver, gold, and corral from Sciacca, Sicily. The museum's resources
include scientific stores of ethnographic material, historical archives,
historical photographic archives, a photographic gallery, a record and
tape collection, audio-visual archives, catalogue sector, library, laboratories
for restoration, carpentry department, and a photographic laboratory.

Museum
of Folklore, Piazza S. Egidio, 1/B. Tel. 581.65.63. Weekdays 9am-1:30pm.
Thurs. also 5pm-7:30pm; Sun. 9am-1pm. Closed Monday. Admission
charge. In 1601, Lucrezia Costa founded a small nunnery of Barefoot
Carmelites, renting a humble house near the Church of San Lorenzo in Janiculo,
or de Jianiculo, called San Lorenzino (today's Via della Paglia).
The building was enlarged in 1607. In 1610, the Chapter of Santa
Maria in Trastevere conceded the decaying Church of San Lorenzino to the
wealthy and pious Agostino Lancellotti who restored it, calling it S. Egidio
and making the Carmelites his heirs. In the same year, Paul V elevated
the religious house and the church into a convent. In 1628, Urban
III conceded, in place of the old church of San Lorenzino, the Church of
S. Biagio and the nearby oratory of SS. Crispino and Crispiano belonging
to the Shoemakers' Confraternity (Piazza dei Velli); the church was rebuilt
in 1630 and, in 1632, took the name of Santa Maria del Carmelo e di S.
Egidio. The Carmelites lived in the convent until the anticlerical
laws drove them out after 1870; from 1875, the building became municipal
property and the site of the Marchiafava Dispensary. On September
21, 1972, restorations started to enable the former nunnery to house both
the Museum of Folklore and of Roman Dialect Poets and the Trilussa Studio,
for which the roof terrace was utilized. The cloister is very plain
in its solid structure; some arches were reopened during the restoration.
There is a marble foot that was part of a gigantic statue of Isis
on the main staircase, that came from the temple of Isis in the Campo Marzio.
The original is located in the street of the same name, precisely at the
beginning of Via S. Stefano del Cacco. Also of interest is the Bocca
della verita, which is a Roman sewer cover representing a grotesque
mask with a wide open mouth. Its original attached to the facade
of Santa Maria in Cosmedin was placed in the porch of this church in 1632.
According to an old tradition, the mask has the power of biting the hand
of those who put into its mouth while telling a lie. There are many
other interesting things to see in this museum if you have the extra time.

Central
Museum of the Risorgimento, Via S. Pietro in Carcere (left side of
the Victor Emanual Monument), Tel. 679.35.26. This museum opened
October 2, 1970 on the centenary of the plebiscite held to decide whether
Rome should be the capital of Italy. All the material gathered was
arranged in part of the monument to Victor Emanuel IV in five chronological
sections from the second half of the 18th century up to World War I. First
Section - documents and objects relating to the period between
Absolutism and the scientific congresses of 1846. Of interest are
autographed letters of Napoleon and Joachim Murat, furniture given by Napoleon
to his sister Elisa Baciocchi, Masonic diplomas, and personal belongings
of prisoners in Spielberg and those of the Bandiera brothers. Second
Section - You reach this section via a marble staircase.
Objects relate to the period from 1846-48 beginning with the pontificate
of Piux IX. Of interest is a flag of the Civic Guard, records of
the First War of Independence, and a rich collection of material relating
to the Roman Republic and Garibaldi and Mazzini. Third Section -
You reach this section by a spiral staircase. It is devoted to the
Decade of Preparation and contains documents and record of Victor Emanuel
II and Cavour. In a smaller room are medals and coins going from
the 18th century up to the Unification. Fourth Section -
This is devoted to Italy from 1861 to 1900 and is dominated by a gigantic
plaster cast of the Monument at Castelfidardo by V. Pardo. It also
contains documents from the first Ministries of the Kingdom up to the taking
of Rome. Showcases have some 3,383 model soldiers from the Enrico
Serra Collection. These are representations of soldiers of the Italian
Army in 1866, whose faces have been taken from actual photographs, though
the uniforms and weaponry are not that accurate. Fifth Section
-
Devoted to World War I. Contains panels that record life in the trenches
through documents, photographs, drawings, and original sketches.
There is also the gun carriage that carried the body of the Unknown Warrior.
NOTE:
you can now enter the monument from Piazza Venezia entrance (looking straight
at the front of the monument) and go all the way to the columned corridor
at the top of the monument for a spectacular view of the city as well as
of Trajan's Marketplace and the Foro Romano areas. It is free.
Be sure to take your camera!

Museum
of Rome and Municipal Gallery of Modern Art, Piazza S. Panteleo 10
(Palazzo Braschi). Tel. 687.58.80. I do not know if there is an admission
charge for this museum. This museum was formed after 1911 with the
retrospective exhibitions of Castel Sant'Angelo. To reach the museum,
you go up the large staircase on the left. In the passageway, there
is the colossal marble group
The Baptism of Christ by Francesco
Mochi. Of interest in this museum include: First Floor
- Room I - 17th century busts incluuding Carlo Barberini
by F. Mochi. Room II
-
Clement XI. Room
III - devoted to Roman Feasts with special note of the painting
Tournament
in 1565 in the Vatican Courtyard by an unknown artist, and Giostra
del Saraceno in Piazza Navona also by an unknown artist of the early
17th century. Room IV - has a reconstruction of the
ceiling of the Kaffeehaus, now demolished, by Ludovico Cardi, depicting
The
Legend of Psyche; also the Feast in Honour of Christina of Sweden
by
F. Lauri and F. Gagliardi. Small Oval Room - portraits of
Popes by unknown Bolognese painter and a Bust of Clement XII by
Filippo della Valle. In the middle is a tabernacle donated by Julius
III to the basilica of Santa Maria in Aracoeli. Room VI -
contains frescoes in chiaroscuro taken from the house of Cardinal Rodolfo
Pio da Carpi in Via Tomacelli and from the Nymphaeum of Palazzo del Bufalo
Cancelleri in Via del Nazzareno, the work of Polidoro da Caravaggio and
Maturino da Firenze.
Room VII - a wonderful fresco of
Apollo
and the Nine Muses by Giovanni di Pietro, that were taken from the
hall of the Hunting Lodge at La Magliana. Room VIII
-
contains a selection of portrait busts, including The Investiture of
Taddeo Barberini as Perfect of Rome by Agostino Tassi. Room
IX - contains small views of Rome. In the Great Hall
are six tapestries from the Gobelin factory in Paris to designs of various
French painters.
The Valadier Chapel - contains stuccoes
in the ceiling and a Tabernacle by Girolamo da Carpi. Room
XII - contains views of Rome. Room XIII - contains
paintings by unknown artists of the 17th century. Room XIV
- contains a model of the Rospigliosi Pallaavicini Chapel in S. Francesco
a Ripa. Room XV - Roman school (first half of the 18th
century), including the
Incredulity of St. Thomas.Room
XVI - a wonderful
Portrait of Pius VI by Pompeo Batoni.
Room
XVIII - paintings of papal processions. Room XIX
- there is a plaster model for Canova's >Self-portrait.
Room
XX -
The Four Crowned Saints by a follower of Caravaggio,
and sacred ornaments of the Marbleworkers' Guild. Room XXI
- devoted to Italian and French 18th and 199th century weights and measures.
Room
XXII
- has the 16th century Magistrate's pews from the Palazzo
Senatorio.

Second
Floor - Egyptian Room
- decorated with paintings
by F. Gai. Chinese Room - contains antique furniture.
Room
of the Virtues - Mosaics, marble pieces, and furnishings.
19th
Century Room
- paintings illustrating Views of Rome.
18th
Century Room
- again, more views of Rome. Two adjoining rooms
have collections of costumes of men and women of the 18th and 19th centuries.
Sala
dei Conservatori - contains costumes and portraits of the Conservatori.
Room
of the Processions - there are two large canvases by an anonymous
painter of the 18th century, showing
Entrance in Rome of the Venetian
Ambassador Nicola Duodo and
Ambassador L. Duodo Visiting the Quirinale.Room
of Horatius Coclitus - frescoes on the life of the Roman hero and
three paintings from Palazzo Rospigliosi. There is also a large collection
of ceramics from the 11th to the 19th centuries. Room of Cephalus
and Procri - this room is very elegantly decorated. Room
of Pius VI - contains the Pope's litter and portraits of him and
members of his family.

Borghese
Museum and Gallery, Villa Borghese, Piazza Scipione Borghese, 5., off
Via Pinciana. Information 06/854.85.77, reservations 06/32.810, press
2 for English. Tues.-Sun. 9am-7pm and
reservations are required.
Ground floor only visitable. Admission charge. The Borghese
Villa and its small palace were constructed at the beginning of the 17th
century outside the Aurelian Wall between the Porta Pinciana and the no
longer existing Porta Salaria, in an area then occupied by orchards and
vineyards. In 1902, the Italian State bought the Borghese property
and the small palace with its collection and turned it into a museum.
Some of the masterpieces contained in this fine museum are the marble Paolina
Bonaparte, or Venus Triumphant by A. Canova; Deposition
by Raphael; Bernini's David releasing his sling (Room II); Samson
in Prison
by Annibale Carracci (also in Room II); Gian Lorenzo Bernini's
unfinished work of Truth Being Unveiled by Time (Room VI); in the
middle of Room VIII is the Dancing Satyr, a Roman copy of the Greek
bronze original of the school of Lysippus, restored in the 19th century
by Thorwaldsen; Taddeo Zuccari's Christ Dead (also in Room
VIII), as well as Dirk Van Baburen's Capture of Christ.
In
Room IX is Raphael's famous Deposition, dated 1507 and restored
not long ago; also, a Madonna and Child by Pietro Perugino, Crucifixion
by Pinturicchio,
and a Holy Family by Fra Bartolomeo.
Caravaggio's famous painting St. John the Baptist also hangs in
the Borghese. There are many, many masterpieces in this museum and
it is definitely on my 'must see' list for those who love art.

Napoleonic
Museum, via Zanardelli, 1. Tel. 654.02.86. Weekdays 9am-2pm.
Hol. 9am-1pm. Thurs. also 5pm-8pm. Closed Monday. Admission charge.
Opened in 1927 and consists of material from the collection left to the
City of Rome by Count Giuseppe Primoli, the son of Carlotta Bonaparte,
who was connected to Napoleon's family by dual descendence. The Roman
Count Primoli spent his youth in Paris at the Court of Napoleon III.
On the fall of the Emperor, he returned to Rome where, amongst other things,
he devoted himself to collecting works of art, curios, and trophies from
the Napoleonic period. The collection is contained in 14 rooms of
Palazzo Primoli that had belonged to the Gottifredi and the Filonardi in
the 16th century, and restored between 1904 and 1911 by architect Raffaele
Ojetti who added a wing towards Piazza Ponte Umberto. Among items
of interest: a painting by J. Chabord of Napoleon on Horseback;
two marble busts of Elisa Bonaparte by L. Bartolini; the library, that
contains books owned by Napoleon at St. Helena, and showcases containing
miniatures, waxes, and snuff-boxes. These are in Rooms I and II.
Items in Room III are devoted to the Second Empire. Rooms IV and
V are devoted to the King of Rome, and Room VI is devoted to Paolina, sister
of Napoleon who married Prince Camillo Borghese. Room VII is devoted
to the general and brother-in-law of Napoleon who became King of Naples;
Room VIII contains satyr and myth. Room IX is devoted to Rome when
occupied by the French during the pontificates of Piux VI and Pius VII.
Room X contains a painting by Louis David of the Princesses Zenaide
and Carlotta, daughters of King Joseph, and Rooms XI and XII are devoted
to the Roman branch of the Bonapartes. Room XIV contains memorabilia
of Mathilde, the daughter of King Jerome of Westphalia.

Goethe
Museum, via del Corso, 18. Tel. 884.17.25. This Museum was opened
in 1973, in the same house where Goethe lived during his stay in Rome (1786-88).
The museum is maintained by the 'Freies Deutsches Hochschrift - Frankfurther
Goethe Museum" (German Free Foundation - Goethe Museum of Frankfurt), which
also takes care of the Goethe's native home in Frankfurt. The museum
is dedicated above all to Goethe's journey in Italy; a series of slides
show various aspects of his life and work.

Museum
of Sound Reproducing Instruments, via Caetani, 32 (Palazzo Mattei).
Tel. 656.41.97. 9am-1pm, closed Sun. and Hol. Admission charge. Visits
by appointment for record listening (tel. 687.90.48). This museum
is housed in the rooms above the State Record Library and occupies three
halls containing rare listening equipment on wax rolls, tapes, and records.
Among the most important pieces: Edison gramophone for recording
and reproduction on wax rolls, 160 revolutions per minute; two roll-turners
made in Germany; and a complete series of Ediphone dictaphones manufactured
by the Edison Company.

Castel
Sant'Angelo National Museum, Lungotevere Castello, 50. Tel. 681.91.11.
Tues.-Sun. 9am-8pm, Closed Mondays. Admission charge; children under
17 and seniors over 60 are free. This castle was built by the Emperor Hadrian
(117-138) as a mausoleum for himself and his successors and was completed
in 139 A.D. by Antonius Pius. In 271, the Emperor Aurelian incorporated
the pile into the defense system he designed. It lost its function
as a tomb and became a fortress. From that time, it was the seat
of a garrison that nevertheless did not prevent the sack of the city by
Alaric in 410, the occupation of Rome by Totila in 546, and the sack of
the Basilica of St. Peter by the Saracens in 846. According to a
legend which grew up between the 10th and 12th centuries, during a procession
led by Pope Gregory the Great in 590 to pray for the end of the plague,
an angel appeared on the top of the mausoleum in the act of putting his
sword back in its sheath, that gesture was interpreted as a divine sign
of the end of the plague. In remembrance of the miracle, a chapel
was built on the mausoleum and on top of the Castle was also placed a statue
of the Archangel Michael. During the papacy of Nicholas III (1277-1280),
the "Passetto di Borgo" was built; this was a covered passageway that allowed
the Pope to move from the Vatican palace to the fortress without being
seen. The castle remained a fortress, a prison, and, in certain periods
housed the Vatican treasury and archives; even after Rome became the capital
of a united Italy in 1870, it continued as a barracks and prison until
1886. For a history of the "Passetto di Borgo", check out Andrea
Pollett's essay and photographs of it on his website (listed as the first
link on my links page). This is a beautiful museum that should be
visited. The Atrium leads to the spiral ramp, 125 m. long,
that makes a complete turn of the castle's cylindrical nucleus, with an
elevation of 12 m., arriving at the cella of the imperial tombs, in which
were preserved the ashes of Hadrian's successors (down perhaps to Caracalla)
and their families. Looking into the courtyard of "Cortile delle Palle"
(after the pile of stone cannon balls), is a marble aedicola ornamenting
the side of the church designed by Michelangelo for Leo X. Of special
interest is Pauline Hall with its exquisite marble floors and walls,
and frescoed vaulted ceilings. Along the top corridor facing away
from the Tiber is a nice outdoor cafe where you can enjoy a cup of latte.
Note the frescoes on the ceilings of the corridors outside, though weather-beaten,
are still visible. There are museum rooms in the courtyard that has
the pile of stone cannon balls that contain armored suits, weapons, and
costumes of the time.

Numismatical
Museum of the Italian Mint, Ministry of the Treasury and the Budget,
via XX Settembre, 97. Tel. 476.13317. Weekdays 9am-11am. Closed Sundays.
Admission charge. Visitors must present an identifying document at
the entrance. This museum opened in 1961 by architect Franco Minissi
in rooms on the ground floor of the Ministry of Finance building, an imposing
structure built by architect R. Canevari in 1877. The rooms contain
medals coined by artists of the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as a collection
of annual pontifical medals from Martin V to the present. Curved
jeweler's showcases in the second room contain a collection of Italian
coins from 1861 to the present.

Museum
of Musical Instruments, Piazza S. Croce in Gerusalemme, 9a. Tel. 757.59.36.
Weekdays 9am-2pm, closed Sunday. Admission charge. This museum was
opened in 1974 and is situated in one wing of the former Principe di Piemonte
Barracks, built in 1903 with access from the garden adjoining to the Church
of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme on its left. The portico leading to
the vestibule overlooks an area of exceptional archaeological interest.
Most important is the collection belonging to tenor Evan Gorga that passed
to the State in 1950. Instruments are set out in 15 rooms.
There is a rare piece in Room XV, a pianoforte made in 1722 by its inventor,
Bartolomeo Cristofori.

Burcardo
Theatrical Collection, via del Sudario, 44. Tel. 654.07.55.
Weekdays 9am-1:30pm. Closed Sundays and all of August. Admission charge.
The collection of theatrical material made by the Societa Italiana degli
Autori ed Editori (Italian Authors and Publishers Association) takes its
name from the building where it is housed, which is called del Burcardo
after the pontifical Master of Ceremonies Giovanni Burckhardt, who had
it built at the end of the 15th century. The Palazzo houses an extensive
library and the museum, which was opened in 1932 and occupies the ground
and first floor. Some interesting items contained here are:
stage costumes belonging to Tatiana Pavlova, and playbills, costumes worn
by various actresses and actors, autographs, caricatures, etc.

SPECIAL
INTEREST MUSEUMS

National
Museum of the History of Spaghetti and Pasta (Museo Nazionale delle
Paste Alimentari), Piazza Scanderberg, 117, Tel. 06/699.11.19 or 699.1120.
Admission charge. Open daily 9:30am-12:30pm and 6-7pm daily.
This is Rome's National Museum of Pasta. Small galleries named the
Wheat Room and the Ligurian Room unfold the saga of pasta and it's present-day
production.

Waxworks
Museum, Piazza Venezia, 67 (on side of SS. Apostoli). Tel. 67976.482.
9am-8pm every day. Admission charge. This museum was conceived
by Canini in 1953, after his visit to the Museum of Madame Tussaud in London
and to that of Grevin in Paris. The first exhibit opened in 1958.
Of note is the duplication of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris as Napoleon
Bonaparte crowns himself Emperor of Franch in 1804; King Solomon of Israel;
Pope John XXIII appointing a new Cardinal; Michelangelo Buonarroti, Machiavelli,
Leonardo Da Vinci, Lorenzo and Caterina de'Medici, Christopher Columbus,
a theatre box in Washington, D.C. in 1865 with Abraham Lincoln in it; Winston
Churchill, Stalin, Roosevelt, Mao Tse Tung, Khruschev, Verdi, Strauss,
Toscanini, Puccini, Wagner, Picasso, Goya, Nobel, Hitler, Pasteur, Himmler,
Galilei, Fermi, and Marconi.

Museum
of Criminology, via Giulia, 52. Tel. 656.88.49. This museum
was opened in 1931 on the initiative of the Ministry of Justice with the
aim of collecting everything relating to crime and the means by which it
is carried out, but also in order to illustrate the activity of crime prevention
and the treatment of convicts. It is located in the Palazzo del Gonfalone,
which is today also the seat of the "Centro Studi Penitenziari" (Center
for the study of Penitentiaries). It extends over three floors with 31
rooms grouped in four sections. Ground Floor - Rooms I and II -
material relating to swindles and forgeries, including forged coins and
bank notes and the tools employed to make them, as well as statuettes,
earthenware, bronzes, and coins, perfect imitations of ancient masterpieces.
Room
III - first of four rooms dedicated to material relating to murders
and damages, including the material employed during the famous robbery
at the Banca Popolare of Via Osoppo in Milan in 1958 (among them the blue
overalls worn by the seven bandits to make them all look alike - clever!).
Room
IV - axes, hatches, and kitchen knives used by the soapmaker of
Corregio. Room V - swords used in the famous duel in Rome
in 1898 between Felice Cavallotti, Member of Parliament, and Count Ferruccio
Macola, in which Cavallotti, after 23 duels, came to the end of the myth
of his invulnerability.
Room VI - precious objects and jewels
owned by bandits Gaspare Pisciotta and Salvatore Giuliano of Montelepre.
Room
VII - different objects relating to the murder of Umberto I by
anarchists. Room VIII
- devoted to smuggling. It shows
the underwater boat equipped with everything necessary for the transportation
of smuggled goods from Switzerland to Italy through Lugano Lake.
First
Floor - The most scientific and suggestive in the museum.
Near the entrance is a model of the "Virgin of Nuremberg", an instrument
of torture used in Germany and Spain until the 16th century, in which the
condemned were shut and crushed. Room IX - devoted
to smuggling of archaeological artifacts. Room X
-
first of the historical section, with a series of proclamations against
outlaws and bandits. There are knucklebusters, truncheons, and beautiful
ancient daggers with inlaid handles. Room XI - devoted
to espionage which displays a trunk, studied in every detail for the transporting
of a person, the Egyptian spy Luck Marco; discovered, however, before the
trunk was loaded onto the airplane at Fiumicino Airport. Room XII
-
dedicated to gambling, among other objects, a beautiful roulette wheel.
Room
XIII - photographs and material connected with the bomb attempts
of Cima Calloria and Collesia. Rooms XIV and XV - examples
of police investigations. Room XVI - contains complete
typology of criminals; includes the skull of the Calabrian brigant Vilella.
Room
XVII - contains material employed in burglary and housebreaking.
Room
XVIII - contains the skeleton of a German mercenary soldier, condemned
to die in an iron cage having the shape of a human body. On the walls
are prints showing the painful story of Beatrice Cenci up to her decapitation
in front of Castel Sant'Angelo. Room XIX
- collection of
clothes used by headmen, still stained with blood. (Warwick Castle's
torture dungeon in England has nothing on this exhibit!) In the execution
room, there are several platforms that gallows and guillotines are shown.
There are also the guillotines of Lecce and of Rome, and the "Sword of
Justice" used in the 16th century, that was found in the bed of the Tiber.
Room
XX - contains instruments of torture, including the mask known
as the "Bridle of Gossips", an instrument of punishment used in the Middle
Age, apparently to limit the loquacity of wives. Second Floor - Room
XXI - devoted to smuggling of archaeological artifacts.
Room
XXII - devoted to pornography and drugs. Room XXIII
- devoted to the historical section with ann exposition of prison uniforms.
Rooms
XXIX-XXV-XXVI-XXVII - contain objects relating to prisoners' shrewd
ideas for contriving useful objects for means of hiding and escape.
Room
XXVIII - devoted to means of confinement. Rooms XXIX and
XXX - contain various burglary tools, among them keys and picklocks.
Finally, Room XXXI - entirely devoted to cutting and stabbing
weapons and to firearms. Certainly not a museum for the squeamish,
but interesting nonetheless. This museum is not recommended for children.

Museum
of the Central Institute for Pathology of Books,
via Milano, 76. Tel. 464.474 or 483.947. Museum can be visited by
appointment only. This museum displays the case histories of damage
caused to books by exceptional happenings (earthquake, flood, and war),
by physical agents (light and heat), by chemical agents (acid inks), and
by biological agents (insects and micro-organisms). Very interesting.

Museum
of the Owls' Lodge (Museo della Casina delle Civette), Villa
Torlonia, Via Nomentana, 70, Tel. 06/44.25.00.72, April 1-Sept. 30, Tues.-Sun.
9am-7pm; Oct. 1-Mar. 31, Tues.-Sun. 9am-5pm. Closed on Mondays.
Built in 1840, this villa's stained-glass windows collection was added
in the 1920s. It was turned into a museum to share the beauty of
its Art-Nouveau stained-glass windows. Villa Torlonia was Mussolini's
residence during the 1920s. The grounds are worthy of strolling through
if you are in the area.

International
Museum of the Christmas Crib, via Tor de'Conti, 31/A. Tel. 679.61.46.
Oct. to May, Wed., Sat. 6pm-8pm. Visit by appointment including groups.
From Dec. 24 to Jan. 15, weekdays 4pm-8pm, Hol. 10am-1pm and 3pm-8pm.
Admission charge. This lost art of miniaturization is taught at this museum,
that is also a school. They have nativity scenes from around the
world - even Japan. One of my favorite museums. Founded in
1967, the museum exhibits cribs and figures of historical and documentary
importance, coming from 29 different countries. More than 3,000 cribs
(nativity cribs) and figures constitute a lively picture of how the Birth
of Jesus has been interpreted in the different countries and of the variety
of materials that can be used: paper, wax, ceramics, dough, straw,
lead, tin foil, glass, sugar. There is also a collection of stamps,
coins, emblems, plaques, and medals with the crib motif from all over the
world. This is among my 'must see' museums to see when you are in
Rome. It is located behind the Trajan Markets excavations on Via
Tor de'Conti.

Museum
of the Argentina Theatre, Teatro Argentina, 21. Via dei Barbieri.
Tel. 687.53.90. Visits by appointment only. This museum is housed
in two rooms on the top floor of the theatre where there is also the last
remaining of the eight "incavallature" (supporting structures for a roof)
built in 1731 by Nicola Zabaglia. On display are photographs and
original material connected with the history of the Argentina Theatre.

WEIRD/MACABRE
MUSEUMS/SIGHTS

There
are several museums and sights that are definitely in the weird or strange
category and all of them are contained within churches. They are:

Museo
della Anime dei Defunti. This very strange small museum is found
in a church called Sacro Cuore del Suffragio, located at Lungo Tevere
Prati 12, a neo-gothic church located next to the Hall of Justice off Ponte
Umberto I on the Prati side of the Tiber. There is no admission and
the hours are 7:30 a.m.-11 a.m. and 5 p.m.-7:30 p.m. The weird thing
about this museum is that it is devoted to dead souls that are trapped
in purgatory who keep leaving messages for the living.

Capuchin
Monks Cemetery/Crypts. Also described on my Churches and Basilicas
page, this set of five underground crypts is located under Santa Maria
della Concezione where via Veneto meets Piazza Barberini. The
crypts contain the remains of over 4,000 monks and a Barberini princess.
The walls and ceiling are elaborately decorated with the bones in astonishing
patterns. Their normal hours have been summers 9a-noon and 3p-6p,
winter 930a-noon and 3p-6p. No cameras allowed, but there have been
postcards available for purchase. Pictures can be found of these
chapels on my Photo Gallery page.

Santa
Maria dell'Orazione e Morte. This church, Saint Mary of Prayer
and Death, is a church of the 18th century which is garnished with
images of skulls, skeletons, and death. It is located on via Giulia,
and it is open at 6 p.m. on Sundays for mass only.

Other
churches housing images of skeletons worth seeing are:

In
Santa
Maria del Popolo, located at the far end of piazza del Popolo, there
are numerous skeleton figures marking graves on the floors of the church
as well as on the walls.

In
St.
Peter's Basilica, to the left of Bernini's Baldacchino near the left
transcept, is a doorway in which a full skeleton seems to be bellowing
into the Basilica from underneath the top of the doorway wearing a flowing
red granite hooded cape and carrying a hour-glass. It is part of
Bernini's Monument to Alexander VII. Not to be missed!

In
San
Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peter in Chains) Basilica, on the left
wall as you are facing the altar, is a painting framed with standing skeletons.
I have no idea what the painting is of, but the frame caught my eye as
being rather strange for a church.